During the production process, the business takes raw materials and components, and converts them into the required products. At each stage, value is added to the product, creating added value.
- Labour Intensive – When the majority of the production costs come from labour. This is usually the case in highly-skilled professions. Most personalized, job producing businesses will be labour intensive.
- Capital Intensive – These businesses require high capital investment, including mass producing firms. Their main costs come from the machinery, raw materials, etc.
- Mass production - Manufacture of large quantities of a standardised good.
- Niche production - Small-scale manufacture of a product that is then sold to a specific section of a market.
Related to the factors of production (land, labour, capital and entrepreneurship), operations management has it's own dandy list; the 5 Ms:
Manpower
Money
Machines
Management
Materials